Saturday, November 27, 2004

This is sort of old (from last Tuesday), but I haven't seen it posted elsewhere. The heirs of the sculptor Paul Landowski, who is the author of the famous Christ the Redeemer statute in Rio de Janeiro, are asking for royalties from the admittance ticket sales into the attraction. This is a very interesting case because there is no doubt that sculptures are subject to copyright protection, but one would have to see if the author was hired by the Brazilian government to make the sculpture, hence it could be claimed that this is "work for hire" and whoever commissioned the sculpture owns the rights. This would also be interesting case because it would be analogous to artists claiming royalties from museum admittance fees.

Would all of those who have taken pictures of the statute infringing copyright? Am I infringing copyright for presenting an inline image from another site?